Zen and the art of dealing with high gas prices

An article on MSNBC talks about gas price these days and how people react to it. It is quite interesting that people are still buying SUV, which uses a lot of gas, knowing that the gas price is skyrocketing. There are alternatives ways to counter this issue, but people just got in the habit of driving their car to work and choosing an alternative way to save money on gas is not an option; even though they are still whining how high it has gone up lately. National Petrochemical and Refiners’ Association executive vice president, Charles Drevna, said that the reason for gas price to go up was because of the process of turning crude oil into gasoline.
The process of turning crude oil into gasoline has become more complicated over the years, particularly as different governmental entities have mandated changes to the chemical makeup of gasoline for environmental reasons. It takes more equipment, more complicated processes and more oil to make gasoline now than it used to, Drevna said.

I think that is a legitimate explanation for the high gas price these days. With the demand of gasoline everyday, it would not be surprise if the price keeps going up. In my opinion, the only way to counter this problem would be to cut back on the usage of gasoline with bus, bicycle, or carpool; but it is easier said than done for people that live like 50 miles away from work. Some find that it’s very inconvenient for them to carpool someone to work and will have to wait for the driver if they happen to get out of work early, or there is an emergency and the driver cannot get out of his/her work.
That is one of the real concerns that most people face while trying to cut back on driving. But I think that if we can somehow lower the demand on gas, then perhaps the price would goes down a bit.